The popularity of bottled drinking water has increased in the past several years. Water is commonly sold retail pre-packaged in bottles, containers, jugs and the like. There are costs associated with prior packaging, handling and storage of water-filled containers. These costs are generally passed onto the consumer.
Prior dispensers have been used to dispense beverages for retail sale in convenience stores that are manually operated by the customer to commence the liquid dispensing cycle. The customer may bring his or her own container to be filled with liquid from the dispenser. For example, P. A. Grimaldi, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,469,150, discloses a dispenser for dispensing liquid into take-away containers. The dispenser has a mobile spout which, when it is in its lower position, is an open contact switch. When the spout is raised, a button can be depressed to being the filling cycle. Additional liquid dispensers having centering apparatus and switch actuated elements are shown by C. H. Sollmann in U.S. Pat. No. 3,250,303; T. P. Hartness, R. G. Hartness and T. S. Hartness in U.S. Pat. No. 3,856,059; and P. J. Daniels in U.S. Pat. No. 4,164,964.